Kebabs don't grow on trees

Children are cruel. And those whose school tiffins would be filled with all kinds of meat would snigger close to the time of Bakri Eid. We never got quite around to saying Eid-al-Azha, or however it is spelled and pronounced in other places. The bakri immediately brought images of goats, and then the allusion to qasais, butchers who were mainly from the Muslim community. (Christians do have their own, though.)

It is easy to blame certain political parties today, but the attitude predates their prominence. It is no different from producing waste, and then looking down upon those who collect it and clean up your space. With meat, there is the added factor of 'sinful' consumption, never mind that animal sacrifice is fairly common in other faiths, too.

I won't repeat that I believe the spirit of sacrifice is more important than the qurbani, of sacrificing a goat on this day, to commemorate an event. But, then, for devotees all symbols need reiteration.

It could be through such sacrifice or other rituals. One hopes that irrespective of the level of faith, or its existence at all, we all learn to give a little of ourselves to something.

Eid Mubarak!

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Reminds me of one year when I was in Dubai. Arabs celebrate rather quietly, except perhaps at the malls. I went to Festival City, and they had a performance. I expected some Middle-East type of music. Instead, it was a melange of artistes from different parts of the world, and the violinist was an Arab, as were a few others.

For those few hours, it was the religion of sur and taal.

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Here is another such moment.

Be...and It Is. Kun Faya Kun

Eid Mubarak...

The term 'Kun Faya Kun' is not so much religious as mystical. It is about being and becoming...

I read this bit:

Does man not consider that We created him from a [mere] sperm-drop – then at once he is an open disputant? And he presents an (argument of) likeness for Us and forgets his own creation. He asks (in confusion): "Who will give life to the bones when they are disintegrated?" Say: "He will give life to them Who brought them into existence at first, and He is cognizant of all creation." He Who has made for you, from the green tree, fire. and then from it you kindle (fire). Is not He Who created the heavens and the earth able to create the like of them? Yes Indeed! and He is the Superb Creator (of all), the Ever-Knowing. Surely His Command, when He wills a thing, is only to say to it: Be! and it is!"

Sajda and the Sadhu

How sorry are the attempts at communal harmony. This picture is an example. The Times of India used this caption:

"A sadhu prays while a group of Muslims perform namaz in Jodhpur on Eid"

Was the sadhu invited? Is he leading the prayer? He is a distance away, so where is the harmony here? Look at the expression of those praying. Their attention is diverted to this spectacle. Besides, I wonder how the devotees would be bowing before their footwear. Sajda to their chappals?

It's better not to project such images. Really. We can all live without variety.

Just a touch of faith...

Never seen the Taj Mahal like this. Pic Hindustan Times

Of the first time I am supposed to have heard the azaan, there is no recollection. It was whispered in my ear as a newborn. My memory isn’t that great. The complete azaan is a full-throated call, every syllable enunciated with as much power as preventing an echo from falling off a cliff. You do not need to understand the language, and you must suspend the ‘yours and mine’ to be able to just listen to the sound. Think of it as thunder, of waves lashing, of a cry, of laughter. Of thoughts unspoken.

I know so little about religion that once when I was at the health club while travelling, and I needed to get to one of the machine, a man on his knees was in the way. I went up to the reception and asked, “When will this guy finish his yoga?”

“He is praying, ma’am.”

I had failed to notice the prayer mat or his hands on his ear. When he turned to the left and then the right, I thought it was an asana. Was I entirely wrong? If prayer is meditation, then it does not matter what you call it. I hasten to add that I know what a namaaz is. It was just the thought of seeing someone there, in my space, so to speak, that confused me.

This year during the month of Ramzan, I heard no azaan. It wasn’t something I was aching to hear. Just the thought of having heard it in days past made me wonder – crowded areas, traffic might well have drowned the sounds. Back in the early days, when one of my relatives fasted, along with the azaan call to prayer, I used to rush to look for the light bulb in a building across. It was an indication that it was time to break the fast. I felt no guilt that I had not been on an empty stomach, but did feel elated as I watched those who had stayed hungry bite into a date and eat slowly, waiting for tongues to form liquid to swallow.

Ignorant as I am, nostalgia is my shelter. Each morsel of life I take is celebration, each morsel I have denied or been denied is a lesson about vacuums, emptiness.

Here is a poem by Gulzar that conveys my thoughts:

Sparsh

“Quran haathon mein leke naabeena ek namaazi

laboun pe rakhataa tha

donon aankhon se choomtaa tha

jhukaake peshaani yoon aqeedat se chhoo rahaa tha

jo aayaten padh nahin sakaa

un ke lams mehsoos kar raha ho

main hairaan-hairaan guzar gayaa tha

main hairaan-hairaan thahar gayaa hoon

tumhaare haathon ko choom kar

chhoo ke apni aankhon se aaj main ne

jo aayaten padh nahin sakaa

un ke lams mehsoos kar liye hain”

My rough translation:

Touch

The blind namaazi brushed the Quran with lips

Kissed it with both eyes

Touched his forehead to the ground

With such faith

As though the verses he could not read

He could feel with a mere touch

Confused I left

Confused I pause

By kissing your hands

Touching you with my eyes

The verses I cannot read

I can still feel them

Eid Mubarak…

For those who came in late, for more of my memories More than a moon

Sacrifice Sublime

I sacrificed the moon last night. A pale moon tethered to the sky. I drew the curtains. But as my eyes were preparing to adjust to the dark, light penetrated through the shades. The moon was replaced.

We do not know it, yet everyday we sacrifice a bit of something. We call it adjustment, tolerance, compromise. Above all, we call it love. We give of ourselves, the sons of Ibrahim are the vulnerable emotions within us.

I celebrate love. So, Eid Mubarak...

- - -

Love came,
and became like blood in my body.

It rushed through my veins and

encircled my heart.

Everywhere I looked,

I saw one thing.

Love's name written

on my limbs,

on my left palm,

on my forehead,

on the back of my neck,

on my right big toe…

Oh, my friend,

all that you see of me

is just a shell,

and the rest belongs to love.

- Rumi

- - -

And for those who are limited to and by ritual, my thoughts on Getting your goat.

Abstinence and egotism

Now that we know Muslims can just do it, courtesy Junoon’s Salman Ahmad, how are believers to manage abstinence? You forsake food, water and other bodily needs for a month and transform into a seraph rather than a siren or a rake.

This sort of austerity is disturbing. On a trip to a Muslim country I was told that even stores that stock pork products to cater to their foreign clientele would continue to do so but behind curtains; the same applies to restaurants in malls where they put up a screen. It is utterly debasing. Why must people who want to eat be made to feel guilty? Do Muslims who stay away from food spare a thought for the jobless in shanties lying on cardboard sheets on stone floors, for whom going hungry is not a matter of option?

It isn’t only about Islam. Hinduism too loves good abstainers. Each day is designated for a god and people fast depending on which deity makes their tummies rumble the most. Christianity relies a great deal on suffering. Mother Teresa’s emphasis on a beautiful death denied people medical facilities. Let us not forget the irony of holy men who perform miracles that produce Rolex watches out of thin air! The Jain devotee who wishes to get initiated into sainthood has to pull out each hair from his head. Years ago when a diamond merchant’s son decided to give up the material life, his family spent crores of rupees on the celebrations and threw precious stones along the route. No one thought of building a hospital or a school. Self-denial is desperate for an immediate halo.

I am not dismissing the believer’s need to follow rituals, but why make a public display of it? Just as flaunting ostentation is déclassé, making a show of abjurance is equally gauche and rather hypocritical if you have a post-sunset a la carte menu. Look around at discussion boards where there is much talk about appropriate cohabitation timings. In this context, Salman Ahmad’s ideas easily qualify him to be a televangelist advising people on how the religion is “good, awesome and great”. His film called Islam sexy. The contextual explanatory analogy is weird: “Westerners talk about ‘Africa being sexy’ to dispel the commonly held image of a region and a people who are mired in pandemic diseases like HIV and Aids, extreme poverty, despair and violence. It’s a way of showing the other side of Africa just as I’m trying to show another side of Islam which is tolerant, thought-provoking and modern.”

If westerners refer to Africa as sexy, they are sick to the bone, the bones of the poor Africans they capitalise on. This is what happens when you use the paradigm of religious and cultural beauty and sell it to the Occident. We can be amused by such flaccid attempts for they posit themselves against cruel fundamentalists. Given that human beings do not lead uniform lives, these guys can turn around and justify perversions too. Despicable as it may sound, we have instances of human sacrifice and virgin blood being offered in several faiths to appease gods. Denying one person dignity and life is used to add to another’s potency — sexual or as power play.

Gandhi, who mastered the art of abstinence, had the luxury of publicly ‘experimenting with truth’. The point is: were those at the receiving end mere guinea pigs? It is worth ruminating that each time we deny ourselves something, it is a choice we make that most cannot. Abstinence is, therefore, just a bonsai version of indulgence.

- - -

Published in Express Tribune, August 10, 2010

Getting your goat

Irony could not get more amusing. Today is Eid al-adha. Pricey animals are just another means to flash money. Muslims sacrifice a goat (or in some countries cow or camel) to symbolise the sacrifice made for Allah. I won’t bore you with the details. The link has more information.

As symbols go, one can have no quarrel although I do believe that we need to understand that what was a message at one time has got to be internalised.

Today’s papers mentioned about this goat called Khusi (happiness) who is going for Rs 21 lakh. The owner is not a Muslim and he had planned to sell the animal to the slaughter house months ago, but the potential buyer refused to butcher Khusi because he has some pattern on his black body that resembles the symbol '786' in Arabic and there is also some crescent moon formation.

That butcher probably felt that he would bring holy wrath upon himself. Now, things have changed. Buyers want this fellow badly. Imagine being able to flaunt a sacrifice that is so expensive. This goes completely against the spirit of what was intended. If something is so sacrosanct then how are they willing to go ahead and kill it? Will they preserve the hide and frame it with the holy words?

Naturally, the seller knows he has got a golden goat and he is waiting for the amount to reach over Rs. 51 lakh. I don’t blame him. I also respect the butcher who refused to buy the beast. It is the wealthy sacrificers, the ones who think they are following god’s dictates, who need to get their heads examined. If we go by the faith, then they ought to sacrifice their own children and only then will god spare them. But can we expect that? Anyone who can afford this much, would have kids who wouldn’t care and just Google the details. Symbols remain just that.

The other aspect in a country like India is that due to several faiths and communal riots at the sight of cows and pigs near places of worship, this becomes one more opportunity for a ‘tense situation’. I’d find this laughable had it not been so worrisome. Animals are slaughtered everyday for consumption and it is by Christians, Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs. Heck, butter chicken is not a Muslim speciality and the Malayalees also have meat dosas. So, this sudden concern by people of other faiths for animals is a bit precious.

Besides, animal sacrifices are common in some Hindu temples. Certain cults also perform human sacrifices. Real babies are killed due to superstition, sometimes for the silly reason of increasing virility if you drank the baby’s blood.

We are, for all the aggressiveness, becoming more and more impotent because those who need to be heard are silenced. Charlatans and totems work on minds too numbed by rituals – and these days such rituals are also politicised. Religion is far from anyone’s mind.

Yup, Eid Mubarak and may we all learn that if we want a ticket to heaven then don’t make life hellish here.

Maulvi in her hand?

Now,now. Mehndi is an important part of Eid. And it is sweet of The Times of India to remember that. As much as they have their ghazal/qawwali programmes that are nice sponsored events. Works as well as political iftaar parties.

But, obviously the advertising department has no clue about how to portray even cliches.

In this advertisement wishing readers Eid Mubarak they have used the most appalling stereotypes in a bizarre manner.

A mosque? The number 786 (conveying 'Bismillah') is just about fine. But, what the heck is a maulvi type reading the Quran doing on a woman's hand? Do they understand subtlety, forget sensitivity?

Even the most religious person would think a hundred times before having this on her palm. To make the idiocy more evident, the other palm has two men in an embrace as they do when greeting each other!

If it weren't so stupid it might have been funny. Well, I hope the TOI cow gets to jump over that crescent moon. Oh, it is there. Naturally...